Taylor Swift Covers Billboard Magazine (December 2011)

American singer and actress Taylor Swift covers the December 2011 issue of Billboard Magazine. Taylor is announced as the women of the year by Billboard Magazine. Inside is an insightful article about a girl who released her first album just over six years ago at the age of 16 and has since grown into one of the biggest stars of all time.

On the women she considers to be her role models:
“I have a lot of role models. Faith Hill is a big role model. Reese Witherspoon is a role model of mine-she’s not in music, but I love everything she stands for. Shawn Colvin is a huge model for me. Her writing has been consistently great and thoughtful and wistful and beautiful. And also-[he’s] not a girl-but Kris Kristofferson has been a big role model for me. When I look at people who I feel have really lived their lives and recorded their lives in music so beautifully, those are my role models. They’ve all taught me lessons just by example.”

On whether she’s ever had a year she just wanted to forget:
“Not an entire year, but I’ve had a six-month period I’ve wanted to forget-whether you’re talking about criticism or an awful breakup or whatever trauma you happen to be going through. Every single one of us has a few months here or there that feel like dark months. For me, what helps me with sad times or frustration or rejection is writing songs about every one of those emotions, and for some reason, after I do that and I’m proud of the song, things make a little more sense to me.”

Taylor Swift Covers Billboard Magazine (December 2011)

On whether she has any idea where she wants to be in 2018:
“I love that Dolly Parton plans out her life in seven-year plans. I thought that was brilliant. There’s so much about Dolly Parton that every female artist should look to, whether it’s reading her quotes or reading her interviews or going to one of her live shows. She’s been such an amazing example to every female songwriter out there. As far as in the next seven years, I’ll be 28 or 29, so I don’t know. It just depends who I meet. But I’ve always hoped that I continue to write music for the rest of my life, and the clearest future I see is always my next album because I’m always obsessed with the latest song I’ve written, my newest idea about the newest thing for my newest album. That’s been my obsession for the last six months to a year.”

On whether she considers herself to be a role model:
“As you enter down a career path it becomes very clear what that career path is going to ask of you. One of the things that is a huge part of making music and putting it out into the world is understanding that you now have a role in shaping the lives of the next generation. And you can either accept that role or you can deny it and ignore it and say it’s a parent’s job to raise their kids. But the reality is what you wear matters. If you’re a singer and on TV and in the living room of some 12-year-old girl, she’s watching what you’re wearing and saying and doing.